The Salmonella genus is part of a large family of gram-negative bacteria found in humans, animals, foods and the environment. Salmonella is a rod-shaped enterobacteria that infects humans and causes typhoid fever, paratyphoid fever, and food-borne illness. In the U.S., it is the most frequently reported food-borne disease. Worldwide, it is the second most common food-borne illness in the world. Salmonellosis affects 100 to 300 per 100,000 population. In 2005, there were ˜36,000 cases reported to the CDC. Salmonellosis is transmitted by the ingestion of food derived from infected animals or contaminated by feces (animal or human). Symptoms include acute enterocolitis with sudden onset of headache, abdominal pain, diarrhea, nausea and sometimes vomiting. Incubation time is between 6 to 72 h (average of 12-36 h). Enteric bacteria have complex genotypic and phenotypic characters that are oftentimes shared across genera. As a result, their genomes share many common sequences. There remains a need in the art for a rapid and robust detection system that can specifically and selectively identify Salmonella in a sample of interest.